Clash at Kursk Episode 1

Several months ago the owner of the Game Matrix, Chris Ewick, asked me to produce a wargame movie for the game he hosted during NHMGS's (Northwest Historical Gaming Society) Enfilade 09 convention:

http://www.thegamematrix.com/staff.html

The game he set up was a Kursk scenario using the popular Flames of War rules and miniatures:

http://www.flamesofwar.com/

Kursk, the largest tank battle in history, was a turning point in the Second World War, or the Great Patriotic War, as the Russians call it:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battle_of_Kursk

Chris set up a massive tank-versus-tank encounter using his finely painted, collection of 15mm miniatures. (He even painted "mud" on the tank treads!). During the 4-hour game, I acted as a "wargame correspondent" trying to capture every moment of the action. This was often hard to do, because it was a big game involving 11 players (4 German and 7 Russian), along with Chris as the Game Master (GM) and his assistant Walter.

Despite the photographic difficulties, I managed to take 237 usable pictures--a record, so far. The sheer number of photos and the 10-minute upload limit on YouTube forced me to break the movie up into 3 parts.

"Clash at Kursk Episode 1" covers the strategic situation, introduces the opposing players and their forces along with depicting the opening moves of the game:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J35ss5nhITw